La Pineda

8th October 2010 by richiep (STAYED IN JUNE 2010)

“We stayed at the villa in June...which was our second visit to this beautiful part of Spain.
The villa locaton is great being located in a street which retains many of the original pine and cedar trees so has a rural feel about it. The shops and restaurants are 5 minutes walk away and the beach is no more than 10 minutes.
This must be one of the best beaches in Spain with clean white sand good quality restaurants one end and quality 'snack' huts dotted along the beach. The beach must be 5 miles long and therefore is never crowded. We particularly liked the cliff walk around to the next bay which is a lovely small bay with a nice beach and a typical seaside village, very pretty and once again nice restaurants on the front, a perfect place for boat and people watching.
The villa is very comfortable with plenty of living space, a nice open plan modern kitchen and a downstairs toilet. Upstairs has three bedrooms one master and two double rooms all with airconditioning which is a real plus as nightime can be very warm. There are also two bathrooms which are more than adequate.
The villa was very clean and one felt at home straight away.
The patio pool and garden area felt very private and not overlooked and we particularly liked the extending canopy for shade which was a new addition from when we visited before.
The pool was very clean and cleary well maintained as the water was crystal clear, which we have found not always to be the case when renting villas.
Around the pool was plenty of chairs and recliners and on the patio a good sized table that the canopy shaded.
We made use of the barbeque regularly which is large and typically Spanish.
Overall, we love this rural part of Spain which is only 40 minutes by train to the centre of Barcelona (station 20 minutes drive, free parking and 9 euro ticket !)
The villa location is great with the amenities not far away and the comfortable feel of the villa which has all the home features will require us to visit again in the not too distant future.”

23rd September 2010 by Lotti (STAYED IN AUGUST 2010)

“Went to La Pineda for the first two weeks in September 2010 and had an excellent holiday. The house is lovely and modern with a garden, BBQ and a great pool! I would say its nice and big for one family 2+ kids, we shared it with another familiy (4 adults + 3 kids in total) and it did feel a bit cramped for all of us. Bedrooms are quite small (not the master bedroom but the other two) but they have big wardrobes and excellent air conditioning and really - not much time is spent in the bedrooms so not a big issue. The en-suite bathroom also good size but the 'family bathroom' is very small and the shower tiny (it doesn't help that there is a tap installed that should be for a bath - it sticks out so much that you cannot really have a shower without constantly bumping into it, ouch).
Living room and kitchen is great - big and lots of comy sofas around, the outside area is also big although getting everybody into the shade at lunchtime around the table did prove a bit of a challenge sometimes. Pool is fab and we spent lots of time in there, the kids in and out of it constantly! The servicing of the pool was also excellent. While we were there the pool people came about 5 times to check, clean and make sure all was fine. What was great also that the garden is really privat.
Negativ outside was the gravel - all the other houses had nice soft grass - this garden was all gravel (although the kids dug a lot and enjoyed that!). I understand that it takes a lot of effort (and water) to keep it green but it would be much better with grass. Around the pool were some tiles but the edges were all crumbling and the wood that defined the edges we had to remove because it kept rolling away and had big bits sticking out so that was a bit dangerous with barefoot kids around. The washing line was behind the house which I personally found a bit unpractical, we kept forgetting washing was on it and spent time searching for 'lost' towels everywhere. But this is only a minor thing of course. The banister on the stairs up to the road was not ideal for our 3 kids (all under 4) because of course they loved climbing up there and with banister very wobbly having big gaps in it we had some worried moments. A gate at the bottom would be good idea and of course fixing that banister...
Surrounding area is lovely - no highrise hotel blocks anywhere! Lovely beach only 10 min walk away and restaurants and supermarkets also around. We rented a car and explored the area a bit. There are some great coves and interesting little towns not far away. Pals is great, the old town worth a visit. Pals Beach is big, wide with lots of golden Sand (bit too coarse for castle building but fine for digging around!) and blue sparkling sea. At the edge of the water its not ideal for small children as the beach slopes away quite rapidly but once you get some waves its great for boogyboarding for the older kids (and grown ups of cause)!
All in all a real family destination. It felt very relaxt and chilled out and also very Spanish. Although you do get lots of Dutch, German and English the mayority I could hear on the beach and in the restaurants was Spanish which I really liked. Weather was fabulous, allways around 28-30 degrees so perfect!!
We flew into Girona which is about an hour (and 80 Euros) per taxi so now would recommend to rent a car from the airport.
All in all a very good holiday in a very nice property and location!”